Friday, 31 July 2009

Hello!! Just to let you know, I'm off on holiday tonight for a nice long week. Back to my mum's for a week. She's going away herself for a few days, so we'll have the flat and the car all to ourselves for a bit, which will be nice! Have checked the weather forecast, and it's unbelievable, next week we should be having sunshine and about 30 degrees C. Lush. Just realised I didn't even say where I was going: near Paris, in France. Can't wait. Anyway, hope you have a good week whereever you are!

Wednesday, 29 July 2009

Today's Wednesday. Don't know why, but feels like it should be Thursday... One of those days I guess!! I'm having a hard time at work at the moment, so we treated ourselves to a curry last night. Not exactly the best move considering how little I've been going to the gym recently (honestly I can feel my cheeks getting chubbier by the day!) but goodness me was it like a taste of heaven!! Curry has to be one of my favourite foods ever, and the hotter the better!

Anyway, I didn't come here to start talking about curry! I wanted to share a little bit of my knitting with you. Earlier this summer I was told that one of my relatives was expecting, so I jumped on the chance to make these little cute things. Before I go on about them, I must thank Saartje for sharing this great pattern on Ravelry. I'm ever so grateful! So here's the first pair I made. As I wasn't sure if it was going to be a girl or a boy when I started I choose 'neutral' colours that would hopefully suit either. I completely fell in love with the mother of pearl buttons.

The second pair I made for someone else in my family. I knew from the start it was going to be a little boy, and since the dad is mad for football (not in the hooligan way, he's a children's football coach!) I thought this would be appropriate:

What do you reckon? I'm waiting for another baby to come along so I've got an excuse to make some more!!

Sunday, 26 July 2009

This is it, Sunday night. Already. Oh well at least I'm on holiday at the end of next week, can't wait! Had quite a busy weekend to be honest. Didn't end up doing any blocking in the end though (Friday night ended up being one of those nights in front of the tv with food and knitting!), but it's still on my list of things to do. Went fruit picking yesterday which was brilliant! Ended up getting tons of gooseberries, raspberries and redcurrants, it was just so much fun! The raspberries were wonderful (and so tasty!),

the gooseberries very ripe, but my favourite were by far the redcurrants. They were so beautiful, like jewels on a bush - simply amazing!! Couldn't stop picking them!

Gooseberries were a bit of a mission to pick though, I still bear the scars from that! Definitely not something to do with children! But anyway, went home to get lots of jam on the go. Raspberry jam, redcurrant jam, gooseberry jam, gooseberry and redcurrant jam, can't wait to try it all! Still have plenty of raspberries and redcurrants left over so tonight for pudding we'll be having a raspberry and redcurrant fool! Yum! Anyway, feel a bit down now, not really sure why, guess it's this depressing grey and windy weather :-(

Tuesday, 21 July 2009

Hello! I'm having to spend three days this week at another office where the access to blogs is forbidden. I am NOT happy!!! It sounds a little pathetic, but honestly, I have a million and one things I want to write about! First of all, I'd like to thank you for your lovely posts, they've put a massive smile on my face! I can't believe how kind random strangers can be, it's astonishing. Actually no, it's fan-tas-tic!

Thanks for your advice on blocking, I'll try it out this weekend when I have a little more time. Or maybe on Friday after work (I'll have the place to myself while boyfriend goes to the football - hooray!). I'll let you know how it works out.

Now for the news. I am officially starting as a French teacher. To my boyfriend that is. I'm not a teacher by training, but I am French, so hopefully that'll help. On the other hand, he's a typical Englishman in the sense that languages aren't his forte... Wish me luck! I have been told and I quote "I know what you're like, don't let it go to your head!" - who, moi?!!!! No way ;-) Unfortunately we'll have to start with the boring bits, like grammar and tenses, and work hard on the oh-so-very difficult pronounciation. Who would have thought "r" is hard to pronounce??!

And finally, back to the mirabelle plums. If there are any specialists out there, I'd like to apologise, I got a little mixed up. The photo I took was of (unripe) cherry plums, not mirabelles (pictured below). I realised there were two different types when I went back to have a look at them on Monday evening. Only to realise there are about five mature cherry plum trees, and one little mirabelle one in the middle! The cherry plums are still all green (but will turn red), however the mirabelles have already turned yellow. So I picked a few and made a little batch of jam today!!! Can't wait to try it out! Would tomorrow morning for breakfast be a little early/ greedy?!

Sunday, 19 July 2009

What a weekend it's been! We've had SO much rain here, it's just been heavy shower after heavy shower, so it limited what we could do really. I was tempted to go to one of those 'pick your own' farms, but boyfriend wasn't too up for it... We did find a Mirabelle plum tree just up our road, so I'm super pleased about that! Can't wait for the fruit to ripen so I can make some nice jam!

Anyway, have been doing lots of knitting. I found this pattern for a dog shaped draught excluder and it looked so cute I just couldn't resist. I'm not too sure if the pattern is correct because what I'm getting is a little different from the photo... I have to say, I started knitting not very long ago (around last winter), so I'm slowly (but surely!) improving my skills. I started with a simple scarf, then moved on to a slightly more elaborate one (see photo, it's a zigzag pattern, it's made with cotton tape and Rowan wool, I absolutely love it!), and then I made some baby booties. But I'll come back to those some other day. Anyway, I need help! I need to block some of the body parts of my dog (this sounds a bit weird I know!) and I've never done this before. I'm slightly confused by the whole process, could someone please tell me how to do it properly? Thank you!

Friday, 17 July 2009

Well, this is it, my very first post on my first ever blog! Very exciting :-) I decided to start this after being left truly inspired by some of the blogs I've listed in the right hand side column. Don't get me wrong, my intention isn't to be 'inspiring' to others, I don't think I can achieve that, but I do hope you find it interesting! Unlike many of the blogs I've been following lately, I don't have any children, I don't have pets, I don't have a garden in which to grow lush fruit and veg, actually I don't even have a balcony!! But I do enjoy all things crafty, have a passion for food, and I hope this transpires in my blog. I hope you enjoy it! Talking about food, here's what I made last night:

I got lots of carrots at the market last week (one of those £1 bowls), and as I didn't really know what to make with so many carrots, carrot cake was my easy answer! I slightly modified a recipe I found on the Good Food website, and it turned out really tasty! Yum!Good night!

Thanks for coming, it's lovely to have you here! Please don't be shy, leave me a comment to let me know you've stopped by, I love to read what you think. I'll aim to reply in the comments section of my posts. Merci!!